Titanic Rearranges Deck Chairs

New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson announced Wednesday that she will leave the paper, two sources familiar with the news informed POLITICO. Managing editor Dean Baquet will take over as executive editor.

Senior editors were unexpectedly summoned to a 2 p.m. leadership meeting at the Times headquarters in New York on Wednesday. The news was then announced to staff by publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. at a 2:35 p.m. meeting.

In his announcement to staff, Sulzberger said Abramson's departure was related to "an issue with management in the newsroom," and had nothing to do with the quality of the paper's journalism during her tenure. Abramson was not present for the newsroom announcement.

"I choose to appoint a new leader for our newsroom because I believe that new leadership will improve some aspects of the management of the newsroom," Sulzberger said. "This is not about any disagreement between the newsroom and the business side."

Baquet's introduction as executive editor was greeted with a standing ovation in New York. Baquet, a former Washington bureau chief, will be the paper's first African-American editor.

Baquet has his work cut out for him salvaging the reputation of the Times, as it's been quite a 21st century leftwing odyssey for the paper.

To recap: Jill Abramson replaced Bill Keller as chief editor in 2011, after he concluded his eight year reign, replacing legendary punitive leftist Howell Raines, he of the Jayson Blair scandal and Augusta golf course obsession. Keller went out declaring Rick Santorum's Catholicism and Michelle Bachman's Lutheranism "fervid subsets of evangelical Christianity." Abramson came in with a religious slant all her own, famously declaring, "“In my house growing up, The Times substituted for religion. If The Times said it, it was the absolute truth.” — only to have that quote airbrushed out of the Times hours later.

As the Gray Lady continues to rearrange the deck chairs while the iceberg looms ever larger, this decade-old futuristic video forecasting the state of the media in 2014 is looking increasingly prescient: